Morrison leads No. 3 Spalding over No. 6 Seton Keough

Junior guard scores 25 in Cavaliers' 55-48 win over Gators

February 20, 2010|By Katherine Dunn | katherine.dunn@baltsun.com

Maggie Morrison's shot has escaped her at times this season, but not Friday night.

The Archbishop Spalding junior guard scored 25 points and hit three big shots midway through the fourth quarter to give the No. 3 Cavaliers all the room they would need to defeat No. 6 Seton Keough, 55-48, in an Interscholastic Athletic Association of Maryland A Conference semifinal.

By knocking off the defending champs, the Cavaliers (21-4) advance to the title game for the first time since 2002. That was the last time they won the title, beating the Gators in the final. That year, they also defeated St. Frances in the tournament, and now the No. 1 Panthers will be their opponents in Sunday's 1 p.m. championship game at UMBC's RAC Arena.

Friday night, Morrison, who scored 11 points in the fourth quarter, hit a follow shot, a 3-pointer and a short jumper that boosted the host Cavaliers' lead to 50-44 with 4:05 left in the game.

In Spalding's last meeting with Seton Keough, a 65-47 loss Jan. 27, Morrison struggled with her shot. She wanted to make sure that didn't happen again Friday night.

"I actually came in right after school for an hour, got some shots up, tried to get my rhythm going before the game even started," Morrison said. "This is one of the biggest games of the season up until Sunday, so my rhythm got going, my teammates were getting me open looks to knock them down, and they went in today."

The Gators (14-10) couldn't seem to slow Morrison, the Cavaliers' court general, who was making big passes when she wasn't shooting.

"I would have liked to have seen us get up on her and not give her so many open looks, but then she made some tough ones when we did get up on her, so that was big," Gators coach Jackie Boswell said. "Our defensive game wasn't what it was last time."

Morrison also got a lot of help from freshman forward Camille Calhoun, who finished with 11 points and nine rebounds and helped the Cavaliers take back some of the inside game they struggled with in the last meeting.

Calhoun did a good job countering the Gators' tough inside threat Achiri Ade, who had 20 points and 16 rebounds but could not take over the game.

No. 1 St. Frances 48, No. 4 McDonogh 39: The Panthers' victory sends them to the title game for the eighth straight year, thanks in large part to Deanna Harmon's 19 points.

The senior guard scored 12 of those points in the third quarter and 17 in the second half after the Panthers (21-2) and the Eagles (17-6) tied at 20 at the half.

"We let them get away," McDonogh coach Brad Rees said. "Harmon just took over. We didn't have an answer for her."